After 11 years as an Infantryman...I'm now a cable guy with an opinion.

Monday, April 09, 2007

KQRS U of M rape case chat

Listening to the morning shows today, 92.5 KQRS had some interesting chatter about the U of M rape case. Tom Barnard, the resident xenophobe of Twin Cities radio, opined on the case. He wondered why any parent would allow their child to go to a major university, where a culture of rape exists.

It's a great question.

We all know that the KQ crew is staunchly supportive of the quagmire in Iraq. Their xenophobic skits display this on a regular basis.

Rape, sexual assault and harassment are nothing new to the military. They were aserious problem for the Women's Army Corps in Vietnam, and the rapes and sexualhounding of Navy women at Tailhook in 1991 and of Army women at Aberdeen in 1996 became national news. A 2003 survey of female veterans from Vietnam through the first Gulf War found that 30 percent said they were raped in the military. A 2004 study of veterans from Vietnam and all the wars since, who were seeking help for post-traumatic stress disorder, found that 71 percent of the women said they were sexually assaulted or raped while in the military. And in a third study, conducted in 1992-93 with female veterans of the Gulf War and earlierwars, 90 percent said they had been sexually harassed in the military, whichmeans anything from being pressured for sex to being relentlessly teased andstared at.

And the 450 women that came forward after the first Gulf War sharing the crimes committed against them.

Think about that. 696,000 deployed to Kuwait/Saudi Arabia. Over a 6 month period of time, more than 450 soldiers were raped.

If 450 women were raped in Minneapolis over a 6 month period of time, we would be talking of serial rapists. It would lead every major media outlet newscast.

And for many, 17 years later, this is the first time you have seen that figure.

So my question is, would Barnard and the KQRS crew let their daughters join the military, where they have an even greater chance of being sexually assaulted?